{"id":77358,"date":"2019-12-11T10:13:16","date_gmt":"2019-12-11T15:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/?p=77358"},"modified":"2019-12-11T10:52:27","modified_gmt":"2019-12-11T15:52:27","slug":"77358","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/blog\/2019\/12\/77358\/","title":{"rendered":"Amid worsening climate crisis, UN Secretary-General sets out top ten climate action priorities for 2020, vows to stay on frontlines"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"fusion-fullwidth fullwidth-box fusion-builder-row-1 nonhundred-percent-fullwidth non-hundred-percent-height-scrolling\" style=\"--awb-border-radius-top-left:0px;--awb-border-radius-top-right:0px;--awb-border-radius-bottom-right:0px;--awb-border-radius-bottom-left:0px;--awb-flex-wrap:wrap;\" ><div class=\"fusion-builder-row fusion-row\"><div class=\"fusion-layout-column fusion_builder_column fusion-builder-column-0 fusion_builder_column_1_1 1_1 fusion-one-full fusion-column-first fusion-column-last\" style=\"--awb-bg-size:cover;\"><div class=\"fusion-column-wrapper fusion-column-has-shadow fusion-flex-column-wrapper-legacy\"><div class=\"fusion-text fusion-text-1\"><p><strong>Report on 2019 Climate Action Summit cites need for major emitters to step up, urgency of no new coal, and jobs and a just transition, among other key priorities<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Madrid, 1 December<\/strong>\u2014With the latest data showing global warming-causing emissions still on the rise, UN Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres today set out ten priority areas where much more action is needed to keep a 1.5C future within reach.<\/p>\n<p>In his report on the 2019 Climate Action Summit and the road ahead, the Secretary-General said he would work to ensure climate change remains on the forefront of the international agenda, including through:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Convening high-level platforms for countries to present strengthened national climate plans<\/li>\n<li>Pushing financial actors to speed up the shift from the grey to the green economy<\/li>\n<li>Facilitating dialogue between countries and stakeholders<\/li>\n<li>Coordinated engagement of the UN System, among other key steps<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>September\u2019s Climate Action Summit delivered important new actions, a surge in climate momentum, and a clear destination: 45% emissions cuts by 2030, on the way to a carbon neutral world by 2050. The gathering, which drew leaders from across government, business and civil society, also highlighted where much more action is needed.<\/p>\n<p>The Climate Action Summit produced 42 multi-partner initiatives in 12 critical areas, and many more commitments and announcement from countries, business and civil society organizations.\u00a0 According to the report, the Summit provided a clear direction of travel for action while reinforcing the goal of limiting climate change to 1.5\u00b0C by 2050 as a long-term objective, with countries needing to articulate what they will achieve by 2020 and in the mid-term, by 2030.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to youth leaders participating directly in the Summit alongside global leaders, the Secretary-General also convened the first ever Youth Climate Summit, proving a platform at the UN for young people to share their concerns, ideas and solutions for greater climate action.<\/p>\n<p>The Summit also demonstrated political leadership with 70 countries committing to deliver more ambitious climate plans, or NDCs, in 2020. While these countries represent a significant portion of the world\u2019s population, they account for less than 10 percent of the world\u2019s GHG emissions. If none of the major emitters formally committed to more ambitious NDCs, some of them \u201ccommitted to commit\u201d by the end of 2020. Finally, 75 countries committed to deliver 2050 net zero emissions strategies by 2020.<\/p>\n<p>Many of the strongest outcomes from the Summit came from the private sector.\u00a0 Coalitions of leading companies also stepped up, across key sectors such as shipping, food and beverage, urban transport and building, and the Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance, which comprises 12 Asset Owners, allocating more than US$2.4 trillion globally \u00a0committed to the full transition of all investment portfolios to net zero by 2050, with strong intermediate targets every 5 years.<\/p>\n<p>The Summit highlighted how climate action can have meaningful impacts on people\u2019s lives, including on their jobs and health, and therefore showed the need to align policies and systems to speed up the implementation of both the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), leaving no-one behind.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Setting priorities for 2020<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Much more needs to be done.\u00a0 In his report, the Secretary-General \u00a0highlights ten priority areas for 2020:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Securing commitments from the main emitters of more ambitious national commitments<\/li>\n<li>All countries coming forward with 2050 carbon neutrality commitments.<\/li>\n<li>Increasing the ambition of national commitments in sectors that were not fully taken in account in the past, such as the use nature-based solutions<\/li>\n<li>Tackling the social dimension of climate change by \u00a0ensuring that national commitments include a just transition for people whose jobs and livelihoods are impacted<\/li>\n<li>Curtailing current coal capacity and ensuring no more new coal power plants are built after 2020.<\/li>\n<li>Accelerating the transition to 100% renewable energy<\/li>\n<li>Accelerating the shift of the financial flows, pushing on carbon pricing to tax pollution not people, and ensuring access to sustainable finance<\/li>\n<li>Stepping-up support for people affected by climate change and making the shift towards a resilient future.<\/li>\n<li>Delivering on commitments made at the Summit to Small Islands Developing States and Least Developed Countries.<\/li>\n<li>Implementing the Summit\u2019s initiatives aiming at the deep decarbonization of key economic sectors<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>The report is being released during the UN Climate Conference in Madrid, where the international community is working on key issues relating to implementation of the Paris Agreement, so it can reach its full potential.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is five minutes to midnight in the global climate emergency.\u00a0 Carbon pollution must stop rising in 2020 and start falling to keep the Paris Agreement goals within realistic reach,\u201d Secretary-General Guterres said.\u00a0 \u201cWe are a very long way behind, but there is still reason to believe we can win this race. The next 12 months will be crucial.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The latest data from United Nations Environment show that emissions must stop rising in 2020 and fall in the order of 7.6 percent every year to 2030 to keep the 1.5\u00b0C goal within reach.<\/p>\n<p>On the eve of the Summit the Secretary-General announced the appointment of Mr. Mark Carney as his Special Envoy on Climate Action and Finance.\u00a0 Mr. Carney will have a focus on ambitious implementation of climate action, with special attention to\u00a0significantly shifting public and private finance markets and\u00a0mobilizing private finance to the levels needed to achieve the\u00a01.5\u00b0C goal of the Paris Agreement.<\/p>\n<p>For further information, please contact Dan Shepard, UN Department of Public Information, 1 212 963 9495, M 646 675 3286 email <a href=\"mailto:shepard@un.org\">shepard@un.org<\/a>, or Matthew Coghlan, Climate Action Summit Team, <a href=\"mailto:matthew.coghlan@un.org\">matthew.coghlan@un.org<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><div class=\"fusion-clearfix\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":101,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[20,5270],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-climate-change","category-press-material"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/101"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77358\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sustainabledevelopment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}